page_title: Battle of Coral–Balmoral
section_title: Planning and preliminary operations
hierarchical_section_title: Battle of Coral–Balmoral / Prelude / Planning and preliminary operations
caption_attribution_description: Civilians sort through the ruins of their homes in Cholon, the heavily damaged Chinese section of Saigon
context_page_description: The Battle of Coral–Balmoral was a series of actions fought during the Vietnam War between the 1st Australian Task Force and the North Vietnamese 7th Division and Viet Cong Main Force units, 40 kilometres north-east of Saigon. Following the defeat of the communist Tet offensive in January and February, in late April two Australian infantry battalions—the 1st and 3rd Battalions of the Royal Australian Regiment —with supporting arms, were again deployed from their base at Nui Dat in Phước Tuy Province to positions astride infiltration routes leading to Saigon to interdict renewed movement against the capital. Part of the wider allied Operation Toan Thang I, it was launched in response to intelligence reports of another impending communist offensive, yet the Australians experienced little fighting during this period. Meanwhile, the Viet Cong successfully penetrated the capital on 5 May, plunging Saigon into chaos during the May Offensive in an attempt to influence the upcoming Paris peace talks scheduled to begin on the 13th.
context_section_description: Despite their losses during the previous fighting, the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong appeared to have gained the initiative. Indeed, although the Tet offensive had devastated the Viet Cong, costing them about half their strength in the south, the Defense Minister of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam—General Võ Nguyên Giáp—had moved quickly to replace these losses with reinforcements, and by early May 15,000 North Vietnamese soldiers were serving in Viet Cong units in South Vietnam. On 8 April, Westmoreland launched a series of large-scale sweeps involving over 70,000 South Vietnamese, American, Australian, New Zealand and Thai troops, code-named Operation Toan Thang I. Meanwhile, on 5 May the Viet Cong launched attacks against 119 provincial and district capitals, military installations and major cities during the May Offensive in an attempt to gain an advantage at the first session of peace negotiations scheduled to begin in Paris on the 13th. Saigon was successfully infiltrated in an event that received widespread international media coverage and resulted in considerable embarrassment for the Americans and their allies, with as many as five of the 13 attacking Viet Cong battalions penetrating the city's outer defences, plunging the capital into chaos and resulting in heavy civilian casualties. After three days of intense fighting American and South Vietnamese forces successfully repelled the assault while, as the peace talks neared, a fresh wave of attacks was launched on Saigon several days later. However, by 12 May the fighting was over, and the communists were forced to withdraw having suffered more than 5,500 dead in just over one week of fighting. US casualties were also heavy, amounting to 652 killed and 2,225 wounded, which made it the most costly week of the war for the Americans.
  The Australians were initially employed on operations inside Phước Tuy Province during Operation Toan Thang I. Viet Cong activity in their traditional base areas in the Hat Dich north of Nui Thi Vai hills, had been increasing in February and March and 3 RAR subsequently commenced operations along the north-western border of Phước Tuy Province on 21 April. These operations resulted in little contact. In light of this, the Commander Australian Forces Vietnam—Major General Arthur MacDonald—believed that the task force would be better employed against North Vietnamese conventional forces, rather than in local pacification operations; later, following a request from Weyand, 1 ATF would again redeploy outside the province. As such, in an operation similar to those three months earlier at Biên Hòa, it was planned that 1 ATF would be used to help block infiltration towards Saigon. Overall responsibility for the defence of the capital was assigned to US IIFFV, and included the US 1st, 9th, and 25th Division, as well as the US 199th Light Infantry Brigade, 1 ATF, and a number of South Vietnamese units. The main deployment began on 25 April in response to intelligence reports of another impending offensive, with 1 ATF headquarters established at the US Bearcat Base, while 2 RAR and 3 RAR deployed to the Biên Hòa–Long Khánh border to block likely infiltration routes east of the large American base complex at Long Binh, which included Biên Hòa Air Base and the large Long Binh Logistics Depot. Meanwhile, the task force base at Nui Dat was defended by one infantry battalion, a squadron of tanks and the remainder of the cavalry. The SAS squadron also remained in Phước Tuy during this period, continuing reconnaissance and surveillance operations in the province.
  2 RAR was tasked with patrolling and ambushing tracks and likely rocket-launching sites to disrupt the expected attack against Saigon. The battalion established FSB Hunt, and conducted a number of small but successful ambushes. Meanwhile, 3 RAR established FSB Evans and conducted search-and-ambush operations before returning to Nui Dat on 3 May after being replaced by 1 RAR, which then joined 2 RAR for a sweep. In response to the attacks on Saigon, elements of 1 ATF redeployed on 5 May, reli
caption: South Vietnamese civilians sort through the ruins of their homes in Cholon, the heavily damaged Chinese section of Saigon following the Tet offensive.
exif: {"Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "GIMP 2.10.12", "Image DateTime": "2019:11:07 17:34:50", "Thumbnail ImageWidth": "256", "Thumbnail ImageLength": "168", "Thumbnail BitsPerSample": "[8, 8, 8]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail PhotometricInterpretation": "6", "Thumbnail SamplesPerPixel": "3", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "232", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "12853"}